Brain Lesson  #4: Compassion + Curiosity = Reframing Off-Plan Drinking

During Dryuary, as you take a 31-day break from drinking, you’ll discover (or rediscover) Moderation Management’s fundamental strategies.Taking an extended break from drinking is beneficial for many physical reasons which you will automatically experience by not drinking. 

To encourage long-term, sustainable change, you can also use this break to change your thinking around alcohol–which only happens if you work at it. 

Look for a new Brain Lesson every week to help. 

We’re on day 23 of Dryuary–and by now many of us have experienced some “off-plan” drinking. If that’s you, don’t let it mean that you can’t “succeed”. The only way we fail during Dryuary, is when we quit trying at all. Mastering the skill of reframing takes time and practice and now is a great time to do it. Finish the last third of the month strong, and plan ahead for any missteps. 

Tell me if this sounds familiar–because this was me for years. Whenever I drank off-plan, my thoughts immediately jumped: 

“You have no self-control.” 

“You know better.” 

“What’s wrong with you?”

Or my personal favorite…”You deserve to feel terrible” (when I was hungover). 

These kinds of thoughts all originate from the black and white, good or bad, type of thinking that most people have about their drinking. When they fall short, just like the old me, they’re ready to play judge and jury and condemn themselves for their actions. Drinking too much, they believe, deserves the self-punishment a hangover provides. 

 And let’s face it, any of those thoughts above will make you feel pretty awful about yourself. 

(They certainly did for me.)  To truly change my relationship with alcohol,  I had to learn how to use compassion and curiosity instead of self-loathing and reproach.  The same applies to having a successful Dryuary. When you are focused on making a positive change, setbacks can be really unnerving, but they don’t have to be. I want to encourage you to approach your missteps differently. 

Adopt this mindset, “Progress over Perfection.” Expect that there will be missteps and prepare ahead of time for how you will handle them. Do not allow yourself to dwell on negative thoughts that lead you to feeling defeated and demoralized. Instead, commit yourself to being compassionate and curious.  Among emotion researchers, compassion is defined as the feeling that arises when you are confronted with suffering and feel motivated to relieve that suffering. It’s basically the opposite of beating yourself up for your mistakes and it’s critical to your success.

What about curiosity?  What does it mean to be curious about your drinking decisions? 

Curiosity means that you are going to ask yourself questions to understand what happened when you decided to drink more than you planned. You are going to become a scientific observer of your thoughts, feelings and actions to determine what was going on. You can handle the situation without shaming yourself and you are committed to truly understanding your behavior. You are the scientist, analyzing data to learn from it. 

As with any positive habit you are trying to incorporate into your life, changing how you respond to mistakes and setbacks requires practice and intention. You will need to purposefully redirect yourself when your brain wants to spit out thoughts like “You know better.” Challenge yourself to use missteps as an opportunity to learn. Be compassionate and curious and keep going.

In the comments below, share how you’re choosing compassion and curiosity to reframe pff-plan drinking.

Stay tuned for your last Brain Lesson next week! 

Molly Watts is an MM  member, Dryuary alumni, author, coach and host of the Alcohol Minimalist podcast. Despite being an adult child of an alcoholic who hated what alcohol had meant in her life, Molly developed her own unbreakable daily drinking habit that persisted for decades. After transforming her relationship with alcohol, she now helps others do the same. www.mollywatts.com